Roland Martin thinks you’re stupid. Well, not you, specifically, just a lot of you in general. “We got some pretty dumb people,” says the Chicago-based CNN contributor, relaxing in the network’s offices at Tribune Tower between appearances discussing “broken government.” “I mean, I know we’re not supposed to call Americans dumb…but sometimes you gotta go ahead and say it.”
There you have it, courtesy of a profile of CNN's Roland Martin, that appeared in Timeout Chicago.
Reporter Cate Plys obviously didn't like Martin very much, at least by the end of the interview process.
And of course, she had plenty of reason to think that way, as do we all: Martin comes across as completely full of himself, a conspicuous consumer, a relentless name-dropper, who, as seen in the paragraph above, which serves as the lede for Plys' article, doesn't hesitate to trash the same people who watch him on CNN. Oops, they are supposed to watch him on CNN but as we see from the ratings, they don't anymore.
And calling Americans "dumb" doesn't help.
So why does Martin still have a job with CNN? One Cable Gamer's theory is that Martin has perfected the art of mau-mauing Jon Klein and the other suits at CNN. That is, if Klein were to discipline Martin, or take him off the air, Martin would call him a racist, and that would ruin Klein's reputation among his Manhattan cocktail party friends.
Of, it's possible that Klein, a guilt-ridden white liberal, simply adores Martin, because he, Martin, has good ties with the Obama administration, and perhaps also because Klein thinks that he, Martin, is so down with the black community--even if, in fact, Martin lives in a swanky white neighborhood in the Miracle Mile section of Chicago. Sort of like the "Superfly" character from the 70s "blaxploitation" movie--Superfly lived pretty well, too.
Either way, Martin stays on the air, free to mouth off, free to insult the audience--and CNN's audience continues to dwindle.
